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Mizerous Pet Owner from Hell Since: Oct, 2013 Relationship Status: Brewing the love potion
Pet Owner
#301: Apr 8th 2025 at 2:55:25 PM

[up][up] Don't forget Deadshot

Just Makima.
KnownUnknown Since: Jan, 2001
#302: Apr 8th 2025 at 2:56:53 PM

I have faith that they will do something better than the infamous Suicide Squad game.

Short answer to this is this isn't being written by Rocksteady, nor is it written as an escapist video game in the first place, so there's no reason to assume it will be the same.

FOFD Since: Apr, 2013
#303: Apr 8th 2025 at 3:10:45 PM

[nja]'s. So the obvious questions, spoiler-y

  • What is our ragtag motley crew of mercs going to do against a reality warping mad god?
  • We saw Void disintegrate people with a wave of his hand and seemingly throughout the city. How do they respond?

Brave New world gave a servicable way for Falcon to deal with Red Hulk, so I'm willing to be open-minded. I don't know who on the team could appeal to Bob emotionally

Edited by FOFD on Apr 8th 2025 at 6:22:24 AM

AlexHopeLife Since: Feb, 2025
#304: Apr 8th 2025 at 3:12:03 PM

One positive thing the film has going for it is that none of the characters are super-popular, so it's unlikely they'll decide to deify them to the same level as Harley.

[up]They will most likely use dialogue.

KnownUnknown Since: Jan, 2001
#305: Apr 8th 2025 at 3:16:14 PM

So far we've had heroes stopping an omniversal threat by "making a bargain," the heroes stopping the mad titan who manhandled the Hulk and had the power to wipe out the universe by stealing his superweapon in the 11th hour, heroes stopping a team of superpowered villains by yadda yaddaing cures for all their conditions, etc. The very first MCU movie involves Iron Man beating a much more powerful Iron Man by blowing up a technobabble reactor. Etc.

There isn't much need to be open minded about it, at least imo. They'll stop it the way heroes always stop threats: there will be some aspect of the story that will recur in the climax that allows the hero to strike a blow or gain a win they wouldn't have been able to do alone. Powerscaling isn't something that's especially important to this sort of thing.

Edited by KnownUnknown on Apr 8th 2025 at 3:19:31 AM

AlexHopeLife Since: Feb, 2025
#306: Apr 8th 2025 at 3:20:02 PM

In terms of power, no Thunderbolt member is superior to Spider-Man, so many people will find it odd if they manage to beat Sentry in a direct fight.

So it remains to be seen whether they can make him win without it seeming like a "Batman-level plot device".

Despite what Stan Lee says, if you want someone to win you have to at least justify it in the plot.

That's why we can discuss how they can beat him.

Edited by AlexHopeLife on Apr 8th 2025 at 3:23:28 AM

KnownUnknown Since: Jan, 2001
#307: Apr 8th 2025 at 3:23:32 PM

In terms of power, no one is superior to Spider-Man, so many people will find it odd if they manage to beat him in a direct fight.

Yes and no. Spider-Man's actually a really good example of this sort of thing, because he typically beats his enemies by out-thinking them rather than overpowering them. Most Spider-Man rogues are puzzles, establishing the versatility of Spidey's powers and his own clever brain by having him solve those puzzles.

The reason people tend to think otherwise is that there is a specific story in which Spider-Man is established to be significantly more powerful than the vast majority of his enemies and that he only looks like he's in trouble because always holding back against them. It's famous amongst the fanbase, particularly powerscalers, far moreso than it is outside of that realm.

But it's worth noting that it's significantly less impactful in the actual Spider-Man franchise. There's the occasional story that brings that back or pays lip service to it, but most writers in the franchise actively ignore it and depict him as being genuinely threatened or overpowered by most of this villains, requiring his usual lateral thinking and cleverness in addition to his strength to overcome them.

This is because Spider-Man being stronger than the rest of his mythos kind of breaks his entire concept and the things that make him entertaining, and it shouldn't be on one writer who wants to do a bit of Rule of Cool to ruin it for everyone else. So while nobody out and Canon Discontinuity's it, for the most part the franchise quietly ignores it.

It's like that one story where Flash evacuates a city in attoseconds. It's Rule of Cool, but outside of the power scaling fanbase it doesn't really impact the character himself.

Edited by KnownUnknown on Apr 8th 2025 at 3:26:28 AM

AlexHopeLife Since: Feb, 2025
#308: Apr 8th 2025 at 3:26:19 PM

You missed the point.

The point of the movie is that they want to sell us on the idea that some guys who are individually weaker than Spider-Man will defeat the Sentry.

That's why we're discussing how they'll do it.

And we don't reduce it to "they'll win because the plot says they'll win."

KnownUnknown Since: Jan, 2001
#309: Apr 8th 2025 at 3:27:05 PM

I didn't miss that point. In fact, I already noted about it:

There isn't much need to be open minded about it, at least imo. They'll stop it the way heroes always stop threats: there will be some aspect of the story that will recur in the climax that allows the hero to strike a blow or gain a win they wouldn't have been able to do alone. Powerscaling isn't something that's especially important to this sort of thing.

Edited by KnownUnknown on Apr 8th 2025 at 3:28:04 AM

FOFD Since: Apr, 2013
#310: Apr 8th 2025 at 3:27:07 PM

Well yeah, I'm not looking for powerscaling but like, going off what we saw in the trailer, Void is just waving his hand and erasing people en masse. So how they get his attention and prevent him from doing it to them with their available resources is going to be interesting. My guess is someone establishes a Morality Pet sort of relationship with Bob before Void appears. In the original comic IIRC the Void was only stopped because Bob himself fought back and was the central character, but these trailers appear to be making this into a team effort where the team acknowledges they all punch and shoot.

AlexHopeLife Since: Feb, 2025
#311: Apr 8th 2025 at 3:27:54 PM

And my argument is that they will be able to stop it with dialogue.

Edited by AlexHopeLife on Apr 8th 2025 at 3:30:37 AM

KnownUnknown Since: Jan, 2001
#312: Apr 8th 2025 at 3:28:06 PM

And we don't reduce it to "they'll win because the plot says they'll win."

That's impossible to do, because this is a plot. Everything about this is a plot. Even Sentry himself is only as strong as he is because the plot says so. There is no situation in which they win or lose because the plot doesn't say they'll win or lose, and as such it is unreasonable to try and dismiss that as an important part of how the story is going to resolve itself.

People weaker than Spider-Man beating godlike beings isn't something that takes a lot of suspension of disbelief to accept. Heroes in stories have been doing that sort of thing for thousands of years.

Edited by KnownUnknown on Apr 8th 2025 at 3:33:00 AM

AlexHopeLife Since: Feb, 2025
#313: Apr 8th 2025 at 3:32:48 PM

For now, let's assume they'll just shoot Sentry until he dies, and that's it.

I think it's best to leave it like that, so as not to run the risk of posting the Stan Lee interview.

Edited by AlexHopeLife on Apr 8th 2025 at 3:33:02 AM

KnownUnknown Since: Jan, 2001
#314: Apr 8th 2025 at 3:33:32 PM

Probably not. If he's anything like comics Sentry, he's probably immune to bullets.

AlexHopeLife Since: Feb, 2025
#315: Apr 8th 2025 at 3:35:18 PM

But if the plot says they can hurt him with bullets, then it will work, because power scaling doesn't matter.

In any case, we'll have to wait until the movie to find out if they'll do it right or not.

Edited by AlexHopeLife on Apr 8th 2025 at 3:36:38 AM

KnownUnknown Since: Jan, 2001
#316: Apr 8th 2025 at 3:37:14 PM

But if the plot says they can hurt him with bullets, then it will work, because power scaling doesn't matter.

Um, no. What you're describing is a story actively ignoring it's own established plot points, which is completely unrelated to power scaling and goes into different topics about writing.

If he's immune to bullets, he's immune to bullets. The story wouldn't establish he's immune to bullets and then undo it unless they also established another means for the heroes to remove that immunity - a la a character like Achilles.

There's a chance he won't be established to be immune to bullets of course, a la a Jedi or something, but I'm just speculating he will be because he's an adaptation of a character who is.

Edited by KnownUnknown on Apr 8th 2025 at 3:40:14 AM

CharlesPhipps Since: Jan, 2001
#317: Apr 8th 2025 at 3:43:37 PM

I mean it's pointless discussing Doylist elements and kind of out of theme with T Vtropes.org.

Author of The Rules of Supervillainy, Cthulhu Armageddon, and United States of Monsters.
AlexHopeLife Since: Feb, 2025
#318: Apr 8th 2025 at 3:44:34 PM

Anyway, I'm sure there are several Batman-beating-Superman stories the Thunderbolts could get ideas from.

Dictionaryman616 Since: Mar, 2020 Relationship Status: [TOP SECRET]
#319: Apr 8th 2025 at 3:45:58 PM

They don't. It already exists in Marvel Comics. I see your point; they won't bother doing that.

Edited by Dictionaryman616 on Apr 8th 2025 at 6:46:53 AM

KnownUnknown Since: Jan, 2001
#320: Apr 8th 2025 at 3:47:51 PM

[up][up][up] To be fair, this is both a Watsonian and a Doylist bit at the same time.

It's both "what could they use to face an enemy like Sentry" which is Watsonian, and "how can the audience buy mortal heroes being a super-powerful enemy" which is a Doylist, both at once.

I just mostly responded to comments about the latter, though I realize that neglected the former. My bad.

@Taking cues from Batman fighting Superman.

There aren't an awful lot of "Batman beats Superman" stories out there, or at least much less than memes would have you believe, but in general I don't think Sentry has a kryptonite in the same way Superman does.

Edited by KnownUnknown on Apr 8th 2025 at 3:54:46 AM

AlexHopeLife Since: Feb, 2025
#321: Apr 8th 2025 at 3:48:59 PM

Even if there is no "kryptonite" in the source material, it's possible that there is a version of it in the film.

Another possibility is that as Val's project, she synthesized a substance that was a weakness for him.

Edited by AlexHopeLife on Apr 8th 2025 at 3:50:43 AM

Ego-Man25 Since: Mar, 2015 Relationship Status: Having tea with Cthulhu
TomWithoutJerry Tyranny Bad, Democracy Good. from Where Might Makes Right and I have no Might. Since: Dec, 2023
Tyranny Bad, Democracy Good.
#323: Apr 8th 2025 at 4:26:25 PM

The Sentry actually beats them all but then has a My God, What Have I Done? moment.

Please remember that, ultimately, fictional works of entertainment are just that.
FOFD Since: Apr, 2013
#324: Apr 8th 2025 at 4:35:51 PM

  • Writers: We wrote ourselves into a corner, none of the Thunderbolts can defeat Sentry... wait I got it.
  • -final battle starts, rain and thunder in the background-
  • Sentry: You're not Earth's mightiest heroes...
  • Red Guardian: No. We are da' THUNDA-BOLTS.
  • -Sentry prepares the finishing blow-
  • -gets struck by an actual bolt of lightning and dies-
  • -everybody glares at Red Guardian-
  • Red Guardian: I told you it was a cool name!

Edited by FOFD on Apr 8th 2025 at 7:43:53 AM

KnownUnknown Since: Jan, 2001
#325: Apr 8th 2025 at 4:38:47 PM

[up][up] It's a weird thing to think about, but that just made be think of an episode of Miraculous Ladybug.

There one episode where the villain has the power to erase people from existence and bring them back at will, so she "defeats" him by essentially tricking him into an Uncle Ben moment: he's taken a shine to her Secret Identity and wants to keep her safe, so she lets herself get got. Then when he goes to retrieve her civilian self this makes him think he accidentally erased her, and then when he can't bring her back (since he erased Ladybug, identity stuff yadda yadda) he thinks he's lost control of his powers, shocking him into undoing everything he's done.

Basically traumatizing him forcing him to learn a lesson about responsibility. Not that I'm saying they should do that here, but it's an interesting way for that to work I guess.

It also reminds me of DCAU's version of Amazo, where he becomes so incredibly powerful that he realizes there's no point in doing what he's doing, which would be hysterical but does kind of take the heroes out of the story a bit.

Edited by KnownUnknown on Apr 8th 2025 at 4:41:03 AM


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